Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Hi,
Erica Perl! Welcome back to Watch. Connect. Read. It has been too long since you
last dropped by.

Erica Perl: Thanks, John! I visit your
blog frequently as a reader (and watcher), but it is great to be back as a
writer.

Thank
you for sharing the awesome book trailer for Ferocious Fluffity. What should we know about Ferocious Fluffity before pressing play?

Erica Perl: Because Ferocious Fluffity is about an adorable classroom hamster who runs
amok, I thought it would be fun to make a spoof of horror movie trailers. I
also wanted to show a lot of Henry Cole’s amazing art without giving away the
ending. And I definitely wanted to use a read hamster, too. I found my star,
Hamlet, on our neighborhood listserv… he belongs to two little girls who serve
as his agent (their fees were covered by a signed copy of the book). My
daughter and a friend helped me film Hamlet, who was very sweet-natured (unlike
both his namesake and the subject of this book).

I
love the surprise under Ferocious Fluffity’s
jacket.

Erica Perl: Thanks – so do I! I thought it
was brilliant to use the scene of kids fleeing from Fluffity in this way. The
art direction team at Abrams (including Chad Beckerman and Pam Notarantonio)
did a terrific job on the design of this book. Henry Cole and I were both so
pleased!

How
will you celebrate Ferocious Fluffity’s
(7/19) and The Capybara Conspiracy’s
(10/11) book birthdays?

Erica Perl: I’m calling 2016 the year of
my “Release the Rodents” book tour. I’ll be at The Flying Pig in Shelburne, VT
on July 19 to celebrate the publication of Ferocious
Fluffity. In October, I hope to celebrate the release of The Capybara Conspiracy with as many
capybaras -- er, I mean theater-loving kids -- as possible.

Please finish these sentence starters:

*Henry
Cole’s illustrations are perfect at capturing the emotional range of human and
animal characters alike. I love working with Henry because his illustrations
have such energy and because he always, always makes me laugh.

*Picture
books are my
favorite kind of books. I love the dance between words and images, and the way
you can see new things in them every time you read them, and how they work best
when read aloud, like theater. I especially like funny picture books. A friend
sent me a note today saying, “the world needs funny books now more than ever.”
I couldn’t agree more.

*Mr.
Schu, you should have asked me if I ever had a pet that inspired the character of Fluffity. We
had a guinea pig named Violet who bit everyone constantly. I wish I could say
that, as in Fluffity’s case, there was a good reason for her behavior. She was
just one seriously feisty pig!

1 comment:

About Mr. Schu

I am a part-time lecturer at Rutgers University and the Ambassador of School Libraries for Scholastic. I work diligently to put the right book in every child's hand. Book trailers are one way to connect readers with books. (All opinions shared are on own.)